By Satish Sekar \u00a9 Satish Sekar (December 31st 2020)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
CAF insist that given the decisions of the Egyptian Competition Authority (ECA), Egypt\u2019s Economic Courts of Cairo and the Competition Commission of the Common Market of Eastern and Southern Africa (CCCMESA), there was no option but to end the agreement with Sports Lagard\u00e8re (for further details see The Poisoned Chalice, Part Three of our series African Football \u2013 A Changing World).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lagard\u00e8re was furious, and with good reason. Its coverage of African football had been totally disrupted. South African media giants Supersport was seriously affected and enraged \u2013 it wanted compensation as did Lagard\u00e8re. Supersport\u2019s reaction took African football\u2019s most important competitions off television screens, making it nigh on impossible for African fans to follow their teams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Within months a bad situation became far worse as the COVID-19 Pandemic prevented attendance at matches. There was no way to follow football and observe it apart from through media. The termination of the Lagard\u00e8re deal and Supersport\u2019s reaction made it impossible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now, when it was most needed, there was no agreement \u2013 at least in swathes of Africa that had depended on Lagard\u00e8re and Supersport for coverage \u2013 to provide African football fans with access to important African matches.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Caught in an impossible position, CAF made it clear to Lagard\u00e8re that \u2018Termination of the Agreement is the legal consequence of the decisions\u2019 mentioned previously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a press release, CAF pointed out that it had \u2018invited Lagard\u00e8re to discuss appropriate next steps and cooperation to ensure the fulfillment (sic) of the obligations toward sponsors, licensees and football fans with respect the current competitions. Lagard\u00e8re has not taken CAF up on that invitation.\u2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some commentators claim CAF should have had a replacement for Lagard\u00e8re ready? How could it do that? The decision of the Egyptian Economic Courts may have been expected, but it was not certain until it was delivered. Termination was a possibility, but it was not an absolute requirement until the convoluted process had ended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
CAF had to wait. It was not as if CAF rushed to ditch Lagard\u00e8re. It didn\u2019t, but after the various bodies\u2019 decisions, what choice did CAF have but to comply? CAF had to negotiate very troubled waters. On one side there was an incensed Lagard\u00e8re and Supersport and on the other there were sponsors, fans and others who wanted to see African football. None were satisfied and they still are not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is a mess \u2013 no doubt about that \u2013 but how can Ahmad Ahmad be held responsible for this? It was not his deal, but the fallout affected him as some blamed him for not having access to top African football. It will likely carry on. Now that Ahmad Ahmad has been banned by FIFA \u2013 the signatories of this deal have not been despite a finding of fraud by Egypt\u2019s Economic Courts \u2013 it will be a matter for his successor to deal with.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Will he blamed as well? Other matters, illustrating my favourite phrase \u2018Qui benefacit amin\u00e6 (who benefits [the most])? arose from this (s<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Satish Sekar \u00a9 Satish Sekar (December 31st 2020) Termination and Effects CAF insist that given the decisions of the Egyptian Competition Authority (ECA), Egypt\u2019s Economic [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2497,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[16,14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2557"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2557"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2557\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2558,"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2557\/revisions\/2558"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/empowersmag.com\/empowersmagwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}